


Blue Wrists

by dollyfish



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst, Arranged Marriage, Forbidden Love, Implied Blood-Drinking, M/M, Modern Era, Pining, Politics, Sibling Incest, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Urban Fantasy, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-12
Updated: 2019-10-12
Packaged: 2020-12-13 20:34:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21003770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollyfish/pseuds/dollyfish
Summary: “Sit with me, brother, we haven’t seen each other in years.”Alan's only regret was that it couldn't stay that way.





	Blue Wrists

**Author's Note:**

  * For [The_Wavesinger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Wavesinger/gifts).

> i know this is probably quite different from what you had in mind, but i dearly hope you can still enjoy reading about these two and their unnecessary drama. i sure loved coming up with it! their story would deserve more than i could give and i'll consider writing more of it in the future, because at this point i just really want them to smash.
> 
> to prevent confusion: Alan and Alastair are the same person, though the former is just an alias at this point, for the simple reason that he never got around to changing his legal papers.

_ “Alastair! Alastair, are you listening? I told you it’s one-two-three-four, one-two-three-” _

“Hi… Alan.” The customer standing on the other side of the pastry showcase blinked at his name tag. She sported a short cut, pink tips, and she gripped her threadbare wallet in freshly manicured fingers. Alan’s name tag sported a fake name but it was new, it was fresh, and he liked the way people said it as he liked all ordinary things, easy and shallow. 

Alan prepared a plate. He smiled, giving her his utmost attention. 

“What do you listen to?” She nodded at his big headphones.

“Just movie soundtracks I fancy.” He pointed at the showcase. “We don’t have much choice at this hour, my apologies.”

“Cool. A fan of movies?” She swallowed and slid over the counter enough money to buy a chocolate tart - not much else from the exhibition of delicacies.

“Me? Hardly. I’m in it for the music over the rest. Pirates of the Caribbean.” Alan pointed at the right headphone and got to work, picking change from a soft green cash register as the beat of the song thinned into a decrescendo. 

“How uncouth. Betraying your classical education, and with a lack of remorse to boot.”

The girl’s mouth stopped ajar. A whiff of breath could have left her pink lips, but she didn’t so much as inhale after those words drifted into the shop. Alan noticed how her Vienna accent had eclipsed, which by itself would be unthinkable for someone as metropolitan as the girl. In those moments she’d spoken a rich, misshapen version of her mother tongue, like the rippled surface of a lake.

He dropped the change on the counter, and as it clinked and rang out in Alan’s ears her eyebrows scrunched up and she gave him a glance between confused and pained.

“_ Sleep _,” he muttered, exhausted.

The sound of her body dropping to the floor wasn’t a clink, it didn’t ring out and didn’t imprint itself in Alan’s mind. 

“Really? What did she do to deserve being forced unconscious, Alastair?”

“I hate that way of introducing oneself,” Alan pointed out. The change was safely back in the cash register. “Just show your face next time.”

Hendrik smiled broadly. Among their kind tradition and ancient etiquette had all the great value one would expect, and greetings didn’t generally require the same warmth that would be considered polite in modern society. The same could be said for physical contact.

If any passerby had set foot in the sparkling confectionery at 20:24 that evening, they would have heard the only two occupants - _ people _ in little more than appearance - speak a rural Romanian dialect. A limited group of individuals believed it made them superior to preserve an aristocratic language.

Tradition, from odd angles. Alan could tell Hendrik wanted to hug him. Thankfully he restrained himself.

“Point taken - Human place, human rules,” Hendrik said pulling a chair from under one of the tables. He gestured at the plastic seat as though he were home, holding out a gallant invitation. It felt grotesque. He _ was _ grotesque, with his copper-red hair and ridiculous clothes. “Sit with me, brother, we haven’t seen each other in years.”

Alan didn’t have the time to argue his_ invitation _ had nothing convincingly human about it, except maybe in a nursing home. 

“You’ll do the talking,” Alan allowed. And he meant it. If time wasn’t a concern to their kind, Alan had lived with humans for many years. Just as a precaution, he sat in front of the wall clock. 

Hendrik wasn’t _ nervous. _ He gripped his hands over the pastel table with something akin to apprehension, but other than that, his sharp eyes didn’t leave Alan for a second. He wanted something and he wasn’t willing to use mind control for it - which he totally could have, for the sake of honesty.

No, he wanted Alan to agree, to give in, to wear a nice dress and raise a chalice to Hendrik’s kingship. To come home. 

“It’s the end of my shift,” Alan grumbled. The first words he’d said in twenty minutes.

The eldest brother brought his right hand up with a flourish, and it stood level with his cutting eyes for a few seconds before he snapped his index and thumb, producing a reverberating wave of deeper discomfort. His brother’s white teeth peeked from his plump lip. His eyes were kind and tinged a brilliant red, like the crimson envelope he placed between them. He had fed before coming here.

“Excellent. Then you’ll agree to follow me without qualms.”

Alan should have laughed, but that presence stripped his soul of every form of glee. “I’m really busy.”

Hendrik looked utterly bewildered, in that collected way of his. “And I’ll be crowned king of Wallachia.”

“Yeah. I live in Vienna, work a part-time job, pay rent, and attend Berlin university online. Try again.” 

As if a coin fell to the floor, the temperature in the room tangibly dropped. It wouldn’t be long before the delicious smell coming from the showcased pastries grew stale and Alan’s job consisted in throwing them out. His next shift would start in a few hours. He was expected to rest, in this time window, and this was definitely not restful.

Hendrik’s hands fell on his knees after they quickly moved as if to express his disappointment. For the first time, his spine touched the back of the chair. “You’re my brother,” he said.

Alan’s jaw tensed. “No, I’m not.”

“It doesn’t matter who your mother is. This old argument…”

“Hendrik,” saying his name was difficult, more than it had ever been, like Alan suddenly wanted to press the dusty keys of a piano and expected them not to sound horrifying. “I’m no longer yours.”

He ignored the red envelope and loathed knowing exactly what kind of handwriting he’d find. It takes a miracle - no amount of time, effort and sorrow could change someone’s handwriting. And Alan tried. 

"How's Laila faring?"

Hendrik's face positively lit up when Alan asked about his wife. "Her? She's got her hands full with the day approaching, but I think she's handling it well. Public affairs and the like. I'm not very good with that" - he cleared his throat before continuing - "Anyways, her cousin doesn't show up a lot."

"Nobody married her and it makes her seem the awkward unrequired guest." Alan wore a candid smile. "Poor thing, if I may say."

"Alina, and even if somebody refused to marry her," Hendrik supplied, "I suppose her name ought to be remembered."

"Ever the gentleman," Alan conceded with considerably less conviction than he should have. "Laila can call herself lucky."

He shrugged his jacket on, making his way to the back of the counter. In doing so, he inevitably saw the girl’s body was still there. 

_ “I listen. You run ahead all too fast for me, Hendrik.” _

_ “I don’t think so, really.” Hendrik sighed. “You have talent! Don’t watch my fingers. Listen to the keys.” _

_ Alastair, despite his efforts, felt his cheeks flush. He did not want the oldest of them to think he wasn’t paying attention. Alastair did not struggle with sheet music either. He knew this Air from the first to the last note, knew what it should sound like, yet his hands refused to weave the flow correctly. There was always something missing. _

_ “I’m afraid,” Alastair said, his fingers brushing over the piano, making no sound. _

_ Hendrik’s elbow was completely flush with his own. Just like their thighs. Alastair could count on a closed fist the times he’d sat so close to Hendrik without drawing back. But now, as the limited room on the padded seat imposed this closeness, Alastair felt calm and appeased, tenderly helpless. _

_ “I won’t eat you if you don’t learn this in a heartbeat.” Hendrik’s smile had the impudent tendency to seep into his skin, warm like candlelight. _

_ Alan smirked back. “And a hundred years?” _

_ “Well, I think it’s fair to say someone in this family did worse than you…” Hendrik let his dark eyes roam over Alastair’s face, from his forehead to the soft, beard-less jaw. _

_ Perhaps it was true, Alastair would never completely shed his childlike traits and the gentleness of his curves, the light dip under his nose and the long lashes that touched his plump cheeks as he blinked. All that wouldn’t mean he’d be considered inferior among his people, and Hendrik said it gave him an ethereal aura, as though Alastair had been graced by something seraphic, blessed even, when he was born. His looks did solicit admiration and courtesy, and Alastair had never met a crossed eye. He attracted all sorts of lingering stares, but none of them as filled with the brotherly pride Hendrik showed him. After all, he was only seventy-two, and Hendrik was twice as old. _

_ “Oh, honestly, Hendrik. You always find ways to sugar-coat it. I’d rather be scolded sometimes.” _

_ “Sugar-coat it? On the contrary, I mean every word. I can lie if I want to, but why should I with you?” Hendrik held his hand over the keys of the piano, preventing them from resuming their lesson. “I’m on your side, after all. And if it takes a hundred years? So be it, I’ll also be on your side then.” _

_ Alastair’s skeptical smirk melted and that promise got engraved in his heart. The contact of Hendrik’s fingers brought him out of his mind, as if every link that tied him to the world, teachings and bonds, even the damned Air and the old piano in their house had lost concrete appeal and he could be content with his brother’s simple, but intense, challenging, but rewarding company. _

_ Hendrik would rise as king one day. They had each other’s back, then and all the times he would require. It was all that mattered. _

_ “You’re on my side?” _

_ “Yes. Yes, of course, you fool,” Hendrik laughed. _

_ Alastair didn’t feel like laughing at all, it would feel unbecoming to soil the music that was to be found in Hendrik’s joy. So, like a spectator, Alastair stayed quiet. _

_ “Let us try this again. I’m sure I’ve almost got it,” Alastair said, his curls falling to conceal the amused glint in his eyes. His fingers went back in position on their own. “One-two-three…” _

  
  


Alan shook his head and looked for the shop keys under the counter.

“It must be frustrating, to some degree - but forgive my bluntness, it looks terribly amusing to me.” 

Hendrik nudged her figure with the tip of his boot. His passive tone didn’t completely hide his fondness toward what he deemed fine sense of humor. Truth is, much as Hendrik’s sense of humor was less than extraordinary, there was no rarer virtue in his household. In this sense Alan felt himself inch closer to the conventional vampire. 

Food for thought.

“After all, you’re required to serve food to them.”

“This isn’t McDonald’s,” Alan shot back. Hendrik’s smooth forehead creased slightly, though the faintest smile remaied, like a vicious phantasm from a long buried past. “You are not planning to follow me home, are you?” He asked with disgust.

The train schedule converged with his shift hours, though he tried not to be one of the lost souls who drifted around the metro after the city went to sleep. He regularly hurried to catch the closest available train, drawing some sort of comfort by the presence of businessmen in lushious suits and the bunch of late university students who paid rent just like him. Alan didn’t always go unnoticed. Though he couldn’t tell which category’s attention he enjoyed the most.

However, if Hendrik decided to stick with him, there would be one hell of a lot more stares than usual. 

Hendrik leaned over the counter, balancing his chin on his fingers. “Well, this is a fairly attractive city, maybe if you let me see it…”

“It’s late. Don’t bother.”

Deflating slightly, Hendrik shook his head. As though he was talking to a silly child. “It’s just the right time for our people to wander around. But I have no intention of disrupting your routine further, you seem to have acquainted yourself with these creatures quite nicely.”

Though neither Hendrik’s tone nor his intention bared malice in any way, his melancholy was crystal clear. 

Alan stood in the corridor for a few seconds, staring Hendrik down and up again. He smiled, something a bit bitter and a bit mocking. “Well? That’s the door. Surely I don’t need to show you out.” 

“Really, Alastair?”

“And stop using my royal name. Alastair died the day he was disowned.” Alan pondered. “No, actually, it’s better if you use the back door.”

“I’d rather have you leave this place with me…”

Alan would rather slit his own throat. “I need to lock the front door.”

Hendrik tended to get soft for candid act and fluttering lashes, and Alan was so good with candid words and fluttering lashes and at pretending to be less intelligent than he really was. Perhaps Hendrik, brilliant Hendrik, didn’t really believe it. But it had always worked. And it still did; Hendrik took Alan’s hands into his own and brought them closer in a way modern people only ever witnessed in theatres. 

“All I’m asking is a couple nights. It would mean everything to me if you accompanied me for the day of the celebration… And you will be free to leave at any point, then.”

Alan wanted to reach his apartment, fall into his bed like a dead weight and scrub the image of himself seated in an unholy chapel in the midst of dozens of vampires who would call him by his royal name from his mind. 

Hendrik took no further step towards neither exit. 

“I just don’t- I can’t understand why you want me there so much. Or at all. My presence would be the quite literal elephant in the room. I’m not sure this overbearing, narcissistic character would be able to keep a low profile,” Alan noted pointedly, crossing his arms over his chest to somewhat downplay the anger that was building like foam between his ribs. He’d taken a bite off the apple of sincerity - and if he didn’t get a hold of himself, if Hendrik didn’t stop looking so nauseatingly lost, he might let something more slip out of him. 

“I supposed you would understand,” Hendrik stopped talking. As if the same thoughts were running through his mind, and he didn't intend to show too much of his hand before Alan, not right then. Not the right moment nor the right place. But he didn't sound unnerved. He sounded calm and collected. “But I also supposed the invitation would have sufficed.”

The red envelope that still took up the middle of the plastic table, undeserving of its purpose. 

Alan gripped the creaking doorknob.

The back of his neck tingled with a shiver. It hadn't been a second, his eyes fixed on the glass door, unblinking. Hendrik's chest right against Alan's back, Alan could feel it just a hair away from his cotton jacket. The light succession of sounds of Hendrik's throat as it constricted before drawing breath. Even if, hypothetically, his lungs didn't need it. Just like his handwriting hadn't changed in the slightest, Alan could never let enough time pass in the company mortals to forget the peculiarities of his own kind. The cold touch of Hendrik's knuckles on his neck. The hard grip around his hip. His thumb stroked Alan’s lower lip, the first mouth he’d ever known the taste of. Alan wondered if Hendrik had tried to forget his taste, his handwriting, or if they burned just as fresh as the day Alan had the brilliant idea to reject the girl he should have married and storm out of their home, only to never return. 

And he felt it, and it was _ very _ real, aside from quite humiliating, how dangerous Hendrik really was here.

"I suppose," Hendrik began threading through the problem, still uncertain. "I suppose there is no such thing as a king beloved by everyone. This much is a fact. However, the throne of Wallachia is known to be a place of loneliness and disgrace… And it's mine by right of birth." He was _ nervous _ now, vulnerable, and Alan was still all too attuned to him to ignore it. "In all honesty, you're one of the few people whom I will always trust to be on my side. If you must hear a selfish reason for me to want you there that day, then I suppose my safety has to do with it and you needn't search further."

Hendrik hummed a hesitant laugh. He gave Alan's shoulder a squeeze, asking for a response, but he eventually took a step back since Alan let go of the doorknob. 

“Is this game of power not being kind to you, Hendrik?”

“Yet,” Hendrik added. “But that could change, in the right circumstances.”

“I won’t stay long.” Alan’s voice was devoid of vitriol, perfectly aseptic. But he knew it wasn’t an accurate mirror of the way he felt and somehow that hurt bad enough.

He heard Hendrik clear his throat and when Alan gave in, the red envelope was already nowhere in sight. Hendrik was smiling to himself, and Alan knew because it was a private smile, one he felt shouldn’t be looked at for too long. 

They wrapped their arms around each other. It felt easier to avoid each other’s eyes. When Alan squeezed back, he remembered the way Hendrik’s stature and build made him feel weightless and safe; but now, though nothing had outwardly changed but the cutesy place of their hardly sweet reunion, Hendrik was holding him to find comfort, to close the wound left to fester for years. The embrace was warm. But cinders, explosive and liquefying and scary, are warm as well.

Alan thought he’d like to kiss Hendrik again, after all. Fortunately, Hendrik couldn’t read his mind, only manipulate it.

“I can’t stay in that place,” Alan remarked.

Hendrik nodded grimly. “Your choice, not mine.” 

Of course, it was Alan’s choice and it couldn’t be changed.

A moan of pain from the general direction of the counter. They loosened the embrace, but Hendrik still held onto his shoulder. Alan grumbled something in tight German. 

The girl sat up on the floor with some difficulty, holding her head as if someone had tried to bash it in. She didn’t clearly respond to any question and her eyes stared at Alan in an attempt to process what he was saying.

Hendrik hadn’t changed his stance and he considered Alan’s body with something close to affection. “I also noticed earlier, but you don’t look well. When was the last time you’ve had a meal?”

Alan didn’t catch the last train home.


End file.
